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for many years. All his body had shrunk. His whole weight had gone into the legs; the legs had become elephant legs. Now even if he wanted to sit, it was impossible. He had to sleep standing. Just in front of him there was a wooden support hanging from the ceiling. He would put his hands on the support and sleep that way, and the whole day also he was standing that way. And thousands of people were worshipping him.
I asked them, "What quality is there that you are worshipping? Is it just because he is standing? Just because he is an idiot? What has he gained by standing? lust look at his face! Has he ever said a single thing which has any meaning?" He was a very ordinary man. But he managed, just by standing, to become a great sage. Now, this man is non-violent to everybody but himself This is sheer violence. And I cannot conceive, if you have reverence for life, how you can destroy your own life in this way.
Jainism is the only religion which allows a monk, if he wills it, to fast unto death. They don't call it suicide, they have a very beautiful name for it: santhara. Santhara means one who has dropped the lust for life, who has gone beyond the lust for living. Many Jaina monks die every year by santhara. The government cannot do anything because it is their religious practice. The secular government is not supposed to interfere in anybody's religion. And they don't commit suicide by taking poison or killing themselves with a sword -- no, they have a very torturous method. An electric chair would be far more non-violent -- you just sit on it and you are gone, you may not even feel it. Or you can be put under chloroform, so you don't even feel when you are and when you are not.
But the Jaina monk will fast for two months, three months. There have been cases which have lasted up to ninety days -- three months of not eating. He goes on becoming a skeleton; as more and more days pass, more crowds go on coming and he cannot even open his eyes. People are singing and chanting in his praise, and I don't think he can hear anything -- for two months he has been on the fast; he is just bones. You can say he is alive because he is still breathing, but
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